Beggars' Night

Last night was Beggars' Night for most of Central Ohio. Sam and Abby brought home a good stash, though I'm constantly amazed and disappointed at the number of folks who simply don't participate. Apparently, there were only about 6 houses participating on the street behind ours, and on our street ours was the only house in a span of about 8 participating.

Sam went as fireman and was quite excited to do so. Unlike last year he was able to stay out for little over an hour but was pretty worn-out afterward. He pretty much demanded to go to bed around 8:00 last night.

Abby went as a devil which would have been more menacing had she not insisted on skipping between houses. At one point last night another girl asked Abby, "Why are you dressed as the devil? You're too nice."

I'll post pictures soon.

Catching Up

Ok, I've not been good about keeping this up. I admit it. I'd promise to be more faithful in keeping it up, but who am I fooling? Anyway, since the last update here are the major highlights and lowlight of the past couple months.

• For several years now our peditrician has been worried about Abby's urine samples. Her samples continually showed high levels of calcium, so finally she recommended that Abby be tested at Children's Hopsital here in Columbus and to make a long story short, Abby has a condition known as hypercalcuria--basically her body isn't processing calcium correctly. It's not too threatening, but we have to monitor her intake of certain foods to make sure she doesn't take in too many oxalates, lest she develop kidney stones. What oxalates have to do with calcium isn't clear to me, but nonetheless Abby is not supposed to have much chocolate, peanut butter, and berries, and a whole slew of other foods are healthy. Poor kid.
• Both Abby and Sammy are playing soccer--well in Abby's case playing. Sam's experience is basically a weekly soccer clinic, which isn't too bad a way to be introduced to the game. He's learning the basics of the game in a fail safe environment. He's learning dribbling, kicking, and even juggling in a fairly fun way. It's pretty neat though I'm not sure why we had to pay $75 for the experience. Nonetheless it's a much better introduction to the game than Abby had. As for Abby, she's actually having a pretty decent season. She finally got her first goal and then followed it the next day with another. She's shown more aggression on the field and more willingness to be part of the action. So overall it's been a good season for her.
• School is going well. Except for handwriting, Abby got very good grades on her interim report card. Why handwriting is graded is beyond me, and since most likely most of her later work will be completed electronically I'm not all that concerned. Actually I wouldn't be that concerned even if that weren't the case. Sam is in pre-school 3 days a week and enjoying it a lot. He even remembers the name of his friends there which is a big improvement from last year.
• Cindy's babysitting days came to an end in August. dag....
• As for me, my generals have been finally nailed down somewhat. This winter, Good Lord willing and the creek don't rise, I'll be taking 3 take home exams on Higher Ed finance, Needs Assessment, and Hierarchical Linear Modeling.

Other thoughts:

• Those calling for Terrell Pryor's benching are being WAY too hasty. It's pretty evident that he does have the tools to be a successful quarterback. That said he needs to start playing better in a hurry.
• The ads both for and against State Issue 3 are horribly disingenuous. Those coming to take jobs in the proposed casinos will be, de facto, Ohioans since they will be paying Ohio taxes. That said the proposal will NOT create 34,000 jobs. The construction jobs "created" by the proposal are temporary, meaning that the only permanent jobs "created" by the proposal are the 15,000 jobs in the casinos. However, there is some debate whether those jobs are created or merely taken from other entertainment venues.